Home Cookin'
by Spirals95
Summary: #18 of the Techorse series. When a pony who looks up to Pinkie Pie spreads a rumor about Applejack, the entire town becomes convinced that she did something terrible! Can Twilight and her friends stop the residents of Ponyville from buying into the story?


Home Cookin'

Techorse series: #18

By Spirals95

* * *

The barn doors at Sweet Apple Acres were wide open, letting the afternoon sun in on the inside of the rural building. Applejack was inside; looking over a small number of barrels she had just finished building. The five containers were made from sturdy wood and the best metal bands that could be found in the area. Each one was also fitted with a rope on top of the lid so that opening them could be easily done with a pony's mouth or front leg. Applejack took one step back from her work and let the hammer she was holding in her jaw drop onto a nearby tool bench.

"Well, that's enough barrels for now." She said, wiping a bit of sweat off of her forehead, "I oughta get some lunch before goin' back to work."

The orange mare reached for her tin lunchbox on the wooden bench in front of her, and lifted the lid. She had packed a simple vegetable sandwich with far too much ketchup on it to taste like anything else, a couple pretzels, and a slice of a new homemade apple cobbler recipe she had tried to make earlier. Applejack started working on her first hard pretzel when a familiar sound of the ground being impacted hard happened outside the barn. Turning around and shoving the rest of the pretzel into her mouth, Applejack went outside to greet her visitor.

"Hey Rainbow." She said, still crunching away, "What'd ya come here for?"

Rainbow Dash removed a large shopping bag from her side, and placed it on the ground beside her,

"I went to the pet store today to get Tank another bulb for his heat lamp. Turns out I was the one thousandth customer or something like that, and they stuck me with a bunch of plastic chew bones!"

Flicking a strand of red hair out of her eye, Rainbow Dash stopped complaining for a second to push the bag closer to Applejack.

"Anyways." She continued, "Since I don't need them, I thought maybe Winona would want the plastic bones."

"Ahm sure she'd love these!" replied Applejack with an appreciative tone, "Thanks!"

"No problem." said Rainbow Dash, smirking that she'd gotten rid of the useless merchandise, "Now if you'll excuse me, I've got some clouds to clear!"

Taking off in a blast of rainbow-colored energy, the pegasus soared into the sky to return to her weather control job. The burst of air knocked Applejack's Stetson hat right off of her head, and it landed into the grass in front of the barn gently. Laughing slightly at the event, Applejack walked over to her favorite headgear and flipped it back onto her head before taking the bag of plastic bones back into the barn. She emptied the contents on a patch of hay next to the tool bench and stared at the contents. There were at least 20 different shapes and sizes of plastic bones, each coated with a pearl white edible material designed to wear off and provide extra minerals to the dog chewing on it.

After having a good look at the chew toys, Applejack got back to her lunch, and started eating the sandwich while looking over some assembly instructions for the next type of barrel she wanted to build. The excess ketchup in the sandwich squirted out of one end, and landed all over the dog toys on the floor. Applejack looked over at her spill, and shrugged it off, thinking her dog could have a little bit of ketchup without hurting her. She finished her sandwich quickly, and got out a hammer to begin pounding boards for the cider kegs she wanted to make. An hour went by, and the hardworking earth pony was able to finish 3 kegs without a single flaw to any of them. As she got out some more nails to begin making the fourth one, she was interrupted by two residents of Ponyville.

"Oh, there you are Applejack." said a familiar voice. Applejack spat out the nail in her mouth and looked behind her.

"Hey Lyra, Bon-Bon." She greeted the pair with a smile, "I'm kind of busy here, so if you want to buy some apples, let Big Macintosh take care of ya."

Bon-Bon shook her head, "We were just wondering if you could watch a tree sapling for me while Lyra and I go to a convention in Vanhoover Island. It's in a pot right now, so if you go and get it, you could keep it here for the next few days without having to go back to my house."

"I guess I could do that!" agreed Applejack. Bon-Bon gave her a few golden coins from a purse tied to her saddlebag, and gave the instructions for taking care of the tree.

"Great!" said Lyra, eager to get to her convention on alien invaders, "Let's move."

She turned to walk out of the front door of the barn again, when Applejack shook a front hoof,

"No, no, wait, it's a little faster the way you're goin' if you take the back door of the barn."

The duo of ponies agreed and thanked Applejack for everything again before leaving out of the back door of the barn. They followed a dirt path out of the farm, and down the country road for the train station, which would take them to their destination.

* * *

Meanwhile, a small foal had been patiently waiting her turn to talk to Applejack too. Her name was Butterscotch. She was a small little unicorn pony with a solid blue coat, a fluffy yellow mane, and a small pitcher of her namesake's syrup for her cutie mark. She was rather sweet and energetic, but almost always made poor logical connections when it came to conversation. In addition, Butterscotch was very gullible. But all of this was easily forgiven by her friends, who enjoyed her warmness to every pony in town, and her creativity when it came to explaining how things work.

Butterscotch had actually followed Bon-Bon and Lyra down to the farm. Her mother frequently had them over as guests for tea or coffee and because of that, Butterscotch let them go see Applejack first. Of course, because they left through the back door, Butterscotch never saw the two actually leave, and so at least 2 hours passed before Butterscotch started to wonder what was taking them so long. Eventually, she lost her patience and galloped through the orchard to get her message to Applejack. She had invented a way to harden butterscotch candy around other things, and was hoping to make a special type of candy apple from it. The only way of course, to confirm how good an apple-based treat would be, was to talk about it with the only expert on apples for miles. Butterscotch arrived at the open barn door, and hid behind one of the two red wooden slabs. She didn't want to interrupt Applejack if she was still talking with Bon-Bon and Lyra.

Butterscotch looked into the room carefully. Applejack's back was turned on her as she continued to hunch over a group of wooden planks she was making kegs from. The unicorn foal assumed that Bon-Bon and Lyra were still somewhere in the room.

It was then that her eyes fell upon the pile of bones, covered with ketchup. Since the toys were of larger sizes, they certainly matched the shape of Equestrian leg bones.

The young pony's eyes widened as she leaned a little further into the door, trying to get a better look at Applejack. When the blonde farmer finally turned her head, Butterscotch mustered all her strength not to gasp at the fact that Applejack had ketchup all over her chin and nose.

The foal shook in terror and thought to herself, "_Applejack… __**ate**__ Bon-Bon and Lyra!_"

Butterscotch threw herself back against the door, and continued to think,

"_Maybe the girls at school are right! Maybe Applejack is a monster after all!_"

She risked one last look inside, and stared fearfully at the bones.

"_And she just ate up my mommy's two best friends!_"

* * *

Butterscotch ran away from the farm as fast as she could. She was afraid to tell another pony about what she had seen. If she did, and Applejack figured it out, she'd be the next to go! But of course, failing to tell would result in Applejack stuffing her freckled face with other ponies as well. The question quickly became, "who to tell first?", and being so young, Butterscotch made an extremely stupid decision.

She ran all the way to her favorite place to get a snack after school, Sugarcube Corner, and flung the door open loudly with her front leg. Mr. and Mrs. Cake stopped their chores for the day to give the out-of-breath Butterscotch a funny look as she ran through the bakery for the back room.

"Pinkie Pie!" she shouted, panting between words, "I need to tell you something!"

Pinkie Pie responded quickly, looking up from the cake she was squeezing icing on. She flung the pastry bag onto the counter of the kitchen, and zipped over to Butterscotch.

"What, what is it?!" she asked, crouching down to Butterscotch's height.

Instead of letting her continue, Pinkie Pie asked her questions quickly and in a very panicked tone, "Did Applejack like your new candy apple recipe? Did you accidentally hurt yourself? _Are they not going to make fudge bars anymore?!_"

"No, it's more important than that!" yelped Butterscotch, trying to get a word in.

Pinkie Pie reared back up on her hind legs and stuck her front ones into the sides of her head, "Something more important than losing our fudge bars?"

"Yeah!" said the young syrup maker, nodding slowly.

Pinkie Pie dropped back onto all fours and said with a grin and shut eyes, "Then you have my attention Butterscotch, fire away!"

Taking a deep breath, she pulled Pinkie Pie's head down closer to her and whispered into her left ear,

"I followed Bon-Bon and Lyra to Applejack's barn. They were in there for so long that I got impatient, and looked inside. I saw a pile of bones dripping…"

Butterscotch finished describing the grisly scene to Pinkie Pie. But being good natured, she knew that Butterscotch probably had misunderstood something about what she had seen. However, Pinkie Pie also wanted to have some fun with this information. Surely Applejack would get a laugh too if she kept Butterscotch going about this for a while. This was the perfect opportunity to play a joke, and get away with it! Or so she thought.

"Didn't you know, Applejack's always done this!" giggled Pinkie, "Sometimes she just gets hungry enough to eat a horse, and does!"

Butterscotch started to shiver again, "But… that's…"

"Weird? Oh I know." Said Pinkie, jumping up and down, "But you ought to go ask Applejack about it anyways! I'm sure she'd be happy to…"

Butterscotch shrieked loudly and ran out of the room just as quickly as she had entered it. Pinkie Pie tried to call out for her, but was too late.

The mare's ears drooped when she realized that her joke had backfired. She had intended to take Butterscotch to Applejack and clearing up the mess. Now Butterscotch was loose in Ponyville, perfectly convinced that Applejack was a cannibal, and was now going to spread that lie all across town. Even worse, because she was a young adult and on friendly terms with everyone in Ponyville, many of the residents were likely to pick up on the story. It didn't matter that many of the residents also trusted Applejack, some of them were dim-witted enough to believe the story because of Butterscotch's genuine horror. The pink pony in the room didn't understand completely what the consequences of her joke would be, but she did know that Butterscotch was probably at least going to be mocked for making up lies about Applejack. She eventually shrugged off her runaway thoughts, and returned back to her work with a smile on her face.

Unfortunately for Pinkie Pie, Butterscotch told her rumor to almost everyone in town, and backed it up with her "proof" that her baked-good-making mentor had confirmed it. The only ones she didn't tell were Pinkie's closest friends; she was sure that they all were conspiring to allow Applejack to feast on the other residents of the town. A good number of the residents believed the story, and when they spread it to their friends, they believed it as well. Half the town had heard the story within just three hours. The citizens went to sleep that night a little bit afraid, knowing that a cannibal lived at the farm just a few miles from their house.

* * *

Not every pony in town, however, had gone to bed at their regular hour. In particular, one mare and two colts had met under the cover of night to talk in secret.

"We have to do something about Applejack. If what Maple Syrup's daughter said was true, she recently cooked our local historian and her best friend." said the current leader, his white mane shining in the moonlight.

The mare, her red eyes glowing with the instinct to protect the young, added, "Even if it isn't true, not doing something about her is going to put our foals at risk. Every night she's free, we risk her eating somepony else."

"Agreed." Said the ringleader after coughing, "Tomorrow we will assemble a group to box in and incarcerate Applejack until we are able to turn her over to the authorities. I have a place we can keep her under watch until she's dealt with."

The third colt in the group, a unicorn with a propensity for light-based spells, turned out a nearby streetlight to provide more cover as a carriage rolled by on the streets.

He then said to his friends, "Listen, we all know Applejack has done some very heroic things in the past. But it seems that now some sick tradition of the Apple family has finally come out of this girl. I can't help but think that this is all a result of the family's poor genetic health. Dr. Caltrops wrote in a recent medical article that families who hate outsiders tend to get sicker and sicker, until something like this happens."

"The Apple family has always been welcoming though, so I highly doubt that's true." Interrupted the mare, "But still, we will probably have to her put in an institution where her mind can be studied, and the rest of us can be safe. We may also have to watch her younger sibling closely to make sure she doesn't grow up to follow in her sister's footsteps."

"Then it's settled." said the leader, smiling in the darkness, "Every pony connected to us will look out for Applejack, and when she comes into town, we'll put our plan into effect. We're going to save Ponyville!"

Then, the three went their separate ways for the night, and disappeared into the blackness of the streets.

* * *

The next morning, Twilight Sparkle decided to take a break from her work at the library to go take a walk into town. She wanted to eat out at her favorite outdoor diner, and figured she could beat the lunch rush if she left early enough. The unicorn pony walked over to her dresser across from her bed and opened the first drawer with her magic. She removed a small bag of money, and loaded it along with a book she wanted to read while waiting for her food into her saddlebags. Twilight then tied them around her sides and headed for the front door. Just before leaving the tree building, she gave one look back at her assistant.

"Spike, remember to finish removing the dog-ears from the returns while I'm gone!" she said as she opened the front door.

"Yeah, no problem." Replied the dragon lazily, waving her off.

Twilight started her stroll for the restaurant, and took a deep breath of the fresh air outside. The sun was shining, the temperature wasn't too hot, and the birds flew overhead.

"Rainbow Dash did a good job yesterday." Twilight said to herself while looking up, "Not a cloud in sight."

One of the other things that the purple mare picked up on was the slightly worried expressions on some of the other townsfolk's faces.

"_What's the matter with them?_" she thought curiously. Giving her striped tail a flick in the air, Twilight scanned over the other ponies attempting to live life normally while obviously in fear of something. Many of the stores were closed, and since it was a weekday, that was very strange to Twilight.

"_There's something they know I don't!_" she continued to think, "_Maybe there's an emergency I don't know about! Maybe we're going to be under attack soon and I missed the memo!_"

Twilight teleported herself quickly in front of a male brown earth pony. He recoiled in shock from the moment, as a unicorn mare was now shoving her face into his.

"Why's everypony scared?" she asked in a panic, a single strand of her hair springing out of place, "What's going on?"

"Nothing… we're just, watching out for somepony dangerous." He said, "Talk to Pinkie Pie if you need to know about it, she's the one who had Butterscotch tell everypony."

Twilight breathed a sigh of relief and said, "All right, thanks."

She took comfort in the fact that everyone was simply keep watch for a pickpocket or something. If things really got out of hand, she could always request that Jools, Jops, or Captain Arbiter show up from Canterlot to handle the rouge. Right now, it was time to get some lunch, and stop freaking out over every little strange event that happened in Ponyville.

* * *

Applejack happened to be walking into town, and crossed paths with Twilight somewhere on the way to the restaurant. When they met eachother, Twilight took note of how the residents seemed to be even more on their guard than they were closer to the library.

"Hey Applejack!" she said, "Where are you going?"

"Just headin' on over to Bon-Bon's place to watch her tree while she's on vacation." She answered, "How about yourself?"

Twilight wanted to spend some time with her friend and asked, "I'm going to lunch. Have time to take a break with me? It'll be my treat!"

Applejack thought it over for a moment, then agreed to the offer, "I guess I am early, the tree doesn't need waterin' for another hour or so!"

"Great!" said Twilight, "Let's go."

Following her, Applejack noticed that everyone was given her frightened looks, and was diving into their homes.

"What is wrong with folks today?" she asked Twilight, walking alongside her.

"Oh, there's a thief or something in town." Answered her friend with a bit of disbelief in her voice, "Once he realizes he won't be able to steal anything with everypony this paranoid, he'll move on."

Once they reached the restaurant, Twilight asked the hostess for a table for two. Immediately she seemed to turn pale when she saw Applejack, despite the country girl's cheerful expression. The magenta colored pony excused herself for a moment, and ran back to her boss. She tried to explain to her what was going on,

"It's Applejack! She's here with our town librarian!" she said, panicking.

The manager placed a hoof on her employee's head and answered calmly, "There's no way she would try anything funny with Twilight Sparkle around. She eats here all the time. Take their orders, and just don't let Applejack hear our motto that we serve anypony. She might take that the wrong way."

The white-maned employee swallowed hard and thought, "_Great. If I don't take their orders, I'm going to get fired! But If I do take their orders and make even one little mistake, Applejack is going to order __**ME!**_"

Of course, it was a no win situation. The hostess and waitress knew she had to serve food at a restaurant first before she could pursue her passion in starting her own, and losing this job meant having to go find someplace else to work. She approached Twilight and Applejack, who were sitting across from each other at one of the many red tables that were outside the restaurant. The other ponies eating lunch at the other tables seemed to be having trouble concentrating on their own conversations, instead nervously eyeballing Applejack. Because they were all sitting behind her, Twilight could see that they were staring at the back of her head, but as soon as Twilight caught one of them in her own sight, they moved their gaze back to their spouse or friend sitting with them.

Applejack didn't care one bit about the others in the outdoor seating area, and had already taken off her hat and placed it on one of the pegs on the sides of the chair. She didn't have the best table manners around, but she knew to remove her hat when eating with others at a restaurant.

The waitress reached them, and setting aside her fears, asked Twilight, "Hi Twilight, good to see you here again. What would you like to order?"

"I'm still trying to decide." She answered, looking at the menu, "Applejack, what will you have?"

Applejack couldn't understand the complicated food choices on the menu. Now, in her mind, the best way to determine what to order when unsure of what the menu says is to look around the restaurant and order what someone else was having. So, Applejack turned around in her chair and focused her green eyes on the various plates the other patrons of the restaurant had in front of them. The customers completely took this the wrong way, however, and whenever Applejack's gaze was focused at them and their food, they tried to duck out of sight, praying that Applejack wouldn't look at them for too long and get an idea.

"Everpony's acting all crazy!" she muttered under her breath before spinning back to face the waitress again, "I have no idea what I want." She answered honestly to their server.

The waitress pulled on the collar of her button-up shirt, visibly sweating, "Oh, that's ok, take your time!"

Meanwhile, some of the ponies at the other tables were whispering amongst themselves,

"Isn't that the town librarian? Why is she associating with that cannibal?"

"Is Applejack going to eat her alive in front of us?!"

"Are we going to have to leave town?"

Twilight finally broke the silence between her, Applejack, and the waitress by saying, "We'll just split a salad."

Applejack gave a look of annoyance when she heard the ponies behind her breathe a sigh of relief. She knew they were all gossiping about something about her. The orange pony sighed heavily, thinking that maybe she accidentally sold some bruised apples and her customers were all questioning her reliability as a farmer. Applejack knew this would come to pass when she delivered the next round of fresh apples and pies. Sometimes, even the hardest-working ponies in Equestria make a mistake.

"That's great!" said the waitress nervously, "We'll make sure it's absolutely perfect for you!"

"Ok…" trailed Twilight, giving the waitress a weird look. After she had left the table to place the order, she turned back to Applejack and asked,

"Don't you think it's strange how much everypony is overreacting to a cat burglar?"

Applejack shook her head, "It's the silliest darn thing I've seen yet. They're scared even though you, me, and the others are here to protect 'em."

"Maybe we should tell the others about all of this if they haven't heard already." suggested Twilight, "We might start having to do night patrols until we catch the criminal."

"I just hope he gets what's comin' to him!" said Applejack with a smirk as she tipped her hat.

* * *

Twilight and Applejack finished their lunch, and left the restaurant satisfied with the food. Soon they were back on their way to Bon-Bon's house to take care of the tree. As they walked down the streets, the residents of Ponyville were visibly up to something. Many of the ponies were giving the two angry looks, and a lot of the colts had assembled, slowly coming up from behind on them. Accompanied by their wives, they were stalking Twilight and Applejack through the town. Of course, the two hapless ponies didn't know about this, and were continuing to soak up the beautiful day. Up ahead of them was Desert Soothe, pushing a carriage with her newborn foal in it, sleeping soundly. Applejack saw the baby Equestrian, and couldn't help but stop Desert Soothe in her tracks.

"Aw!" cooed Twilight as she looked at the sleeping newborn, "Your foal is so cute, Desert Soothe! She has your eyes and tail."

"Thanks Twilight, but we've really got to keep going!" said Desert, scraping her front hoof in fear on the ground. It was obvious to Twilight that she was for some reason uncomfortable around the two of them.

Applejack had a look at the foal as well and said, "Well shoot, she's so cute I could just eat her up!"

Desert Soothe screamed and steered the carriage away from the two, waking her offspring and making her cry. Applejack's mouth dropped open at the absolutely outrageous behavior, and looked at Twilight.

She said to her slowly, "Twilight… I think… _I'm_ the pony they're talkin' about."

"Don't be ridiculous!" answered Twilight with fear, looking back and forth at the angry crowd gathering around them, "Everypony knows you better than that."

The two watched on as the line of ponies, shoulder to shoulder, walked forward, trying to box them in.

"Alright Twilight Sparkle." said one of the members of the mob, "Give us Applejack, and you can go!"

"You're all making a big mistake!" said Twilight, "Applejack isn't going to rob anypony!"

"Rob us?" responded a mare from the crowd, "She plans on eating our foals!"

"Aw come on now!" protested Applejack angrily as she stomped her hoof on the ground, "That was a figure of speech!"

"Oh no it wasn't!" countered another pony, "We heard from a very frightened foal that you ate Bon-Bon and Lyra in your barn. How long have you been doing this behind our backs?"

Applejack shook her head and explained, "They went away on vacation, I didn't eat 'em!"

"A likely explanation!" shouted a stallion from the back of the horde.

Twilight stepped in front of Applejack, and her horn glowed purple as a large bubble of magic energy formed around them. Some of the mob ponies came up and tapped on the energy field with their front legs. Knowing it was impenetrable without weapons or brute magical force, they sunk back and planned on a way to reach them.

"We'll be safe under here until we resolve this." She said, comforting Applejack as best as possible.

Applejack sighed and stepped outside of the force field, "This ain't right, Twi. I have to defend myself and prove that I didn't do this."

"Ok," She said, turning to face the angry townsponies, "Can you give me a chance to explain myself?"

"Sure, once we have you locked up where you can't be any harm!" Came the response from the ringleader. Twilight dropped her barrier, and her ears sank in misery as she watched her friend get taken away. Soon, Applejack found herself in a large metal cage with straw on the floor for bedding. The cage was on a cart so that Applejack could be taken to prison once she had been confirmed to be a criminal by the citizens. Even though they had promised to listen to Applejack's side of the story, they failed to do so, calling her names and yelling at her for her supposed crimes. Soon, the commotion had caused most of Twilight's friends to gather with her in the town square. Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Spike, and Pinkie Pie had all showed up to try and talk some sense into the other residents of Ponyville.

* * *

Rainbow Dash landed on top of the cage containing her friend and asked, "What's wrong with you ponies? Twilight here tells me you've locked up Applejack because you think she's been running around eating you. Are your feathers loose?"

"Poor Applejack!" moaned Rarity, standing next to Twilight, "She doesn't deserve to be treated like an animal, even if she sometimes acts like one."

"Thanks…" grunted Applejack sarcastically. She rested her body down on the hay, and pushed some of it around with a hoof. The once-happy and appreciated pony looked defeated and miserable.

Spike finally clenched his fists, stepped up to the crowd, and said, "Can't you guys remember all the things Applejack has done for you? The stampedes she's stopped? The time she rescued a mare from a burning building? Or what about the time she stopped the madmare of Hoofington from dynamiting the Ponyville dam and flooding us?"

"Spike, there was never a madmare of Hoofington, that was the bad guy of a story I wrote!" whispered Twilight.

Spike grabbed her head with one of his scaly hands and whispered back, "I know that, but they don't!"

Rainbow Dash pointed down to Spike, and gave her wings a sharp flap to emphasize her anger, "See? There's plenty of evidence that Applejack isn't a cannibal."

"Even so, Butterscotch's fear of Applejack was too real to take any chances." stated a colt, "We're keeping her here until we can get Celestia and her guards to take her to trial."

Pinkie Pie looked around nervously, getting increasingly more uncomfortable with the situation, until she finally shouted out, "I can't take it anymore! It's all my fault that Butterscotch believed Applejack was a cannibal!"

The crowd's attention was immediately on Pinkie Pie, who was panting heavily after screaming so loudly.

"Lemme go get Butterscotch and prove it!" said Pinkie Pie, "This was all a big joke."

The mob agreed to allow her to go retrieve Butterscotch, and soon the young foal was standing in front of the cage, looking right at Applejack.

"Butterscotch." Said Twilight Sparkle, "Tell everypony exactly what you saw when you went to Applejack's barn."

"Well," Said the foal, "I entered the door to the barn, and saw a pile of bones in the corner, dripping with red stuff! The same red stuff was on Applejack's lips. So I assumed that she had eaten Bon-Bon and Lyra. When I talked to Pinkie Pie, she confirmed it!"

Immediately, the other friends present at the cage knew exactly what had happened.

Rainbow Dash jumped down from atop the cage and landed next to Butterscotch. She put a front leg around her and explained, "Those weren't real bones, they were plastic ones for Applejack's dog. I got them as a stupid prize from the pet shop owner when he wanted to dump his unwanted merchandise on me."

"Hey, that's right!" said the pet store owner from in the crowd, "I did give a whole bunch of bones away to Rainbow Dash." He retreated in shame when the others gave him a nasty look for simply dumping his unwanted inventory on Rainbow Dash.

"And that stuff on the bones wasn't what you think it was." said Applejack, standing up from the straw, "That was ketchup. I put way too much in my sandwich yesterday, and most of it got all over those bones."

"Mistaking ketchup for blood, classic!" giggled Pinkie Pie.

Twilight silenced her gently, before finishing, "So as you can all see, this was all just a big mistake. Butterscotch saw something she mistook for a threat, and then spread it to Pinkie Pie, who spread it to everypony else. Can't you all see that you've made a mistake?"

Eventually, after talking it over, the crowd became ashamed of themselves, and opened the door to the cage. Applejack walked out of it into the sunlight again, and moved over to Butterscotch, who looked very sad at what she had caused.

"I'm so sorry I made everyone think you were evil." She said, trying not to sob, "I promise I won't be so fast to think like that anymore."

"Oh, it's ok sugarcube, you were scared and didn't know what to do." soothed Applejack, rubbing Butterscotch's mane gently.

"I'm sorry too!" blurted Pinkie Pie, "I had a little too much fun with Butterscotch, and you ended up in that cage."

"Wouldn't be the first time _you_ overreacted to somethin'." Laughed Applejack at her friend, "I forgive ya."

The last ponies to give their apologies were the three who had organized Applejack's capture. Unsurprisingly, Applejack forgave each of them, although she was a little upset over the ringleader thinking that her family might have bad genetics. Pinkie Pie promised to write Dr. Caltrops and make sure that he wasn't talking about the Apple family when he wrote that article. She knew he could change his mind.

"All that's left unanswered is, what really did happen to Bon-Bon and Lyra?" asked Spike after everything had settled down, "Did they really go on vacation like you said, Applejack?"

Something clicked in the country girl's mind as soon as the dragon had finished saying that,

"Oh shoot, I need to go water Lyra's tree! Sorry everypony, but I gotta leave right this moment to go keep a promise!"

Galloping off, Applejack rushed to go try and save the parched houseplant. Her friends smiled and shook their heads gently, knowing her all too well. Soon the crowd dispersed, and life returned to normal in Ponyville, if there really was such a thing. Butterscotch too tried to leave, but Twilight called out to her,

"Butterscotch, I've been thinking."

The blue foal turned around and looked Twilight in her purple eyes.

"Yes, Twilight?"

Twilight asked her, "You learned a lot today about trying to figure out all the facts first before accusing somepony of something. If it's okay with your parents, I'd love to let you write a letter to princess Celestia about it. I'm sure the princess would love to know how some of her other subjects are growing."

"Really?" asked Butterscotch, eyes beaming, "I'd love to do that!"

"Then let's go!" said Rainbow Dash, spreading her wings, "Last one to Butterscotch's house is an old nag!"

Taking off, the friends raced through the town. They had put an end to a nasty rumor in town, and it was certainly time for a break. Sometimes, when you live in a small town like Ponyville, all it takes is one little slip of the tongue to cause a whole bunch of trouble.


End file.
